


in an ageless dark

by enemeriad



Category: A Court of Thorns and Roses Series - Sarah J. Maas
Genre: And More Angst, Angst, Eventual Smut, F/M
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2019-01-03
Updated: 2019-01-03
Packaged: 2019-10-03 12:43:53
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,265
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17284292
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/enemeriad/pseuds/enemeriad
Summary: She is Made, forged from elements older than the universe itself. She no longer feels, time or him. Exiled by her sister, Nesta finds herself on the edge of the world, forced to find her place amongst a people who hate her only as much as she hates herself.





	in an ageless dark

 

The first days of Spring are bitterly cold, some outcrop of ancient magic failing to keep her small apartment by the Sidra temperate like it does the rest of the city. It makes little difference, given she can barely tell the difference between night and day let alone care about the climate. 

It isn't the cold, however, that wakes her but the incessant crowing at the door. 

'I know you're in there.'

She stares up at the ceiling above her, clenches her nails into her palms twice, just to  _feel_ something but she finds neither irritation nor anger simmer. Instead, a futile apathy curls itself around her throat and heaves her to her feet and across the room to the door. 

She winces, the feeling returning to her extremities as she slowly unlatches the four deadlocks. It takes an age to straighten her spine but she manages, just. 

'Hullo,' she says cooly. 

He peers behind her and grunts, 'I see you haven't packed.'

It takes a second to recall  _what_ she was supposed to pack for. How quickly her sister's enforced exile had escaped her. She let him take in the apartment, the staleness in the air, the unkemptness, the very  _lack_ of personability this apartment vibrated. Was she supposed to pack? Wouldn't they come back each evening after he realised that  _mountain air_ wasn't going to fix whatever they believed was wrong with her?

She arches an eyebrow, 'Have you lost the ability to fly?'

'We're not coming back to Velaris. Not for a while.'

She thinks, vaguely, that a long time ago that would've frustrated her - not being able to have her own way, not being able to craft some sort of independent path. That some woman, some echo of this person she is now, may have even argued. 

'Wonderful,' she says and looks at him expectantly, 'shall we go, then?'

Every muscle in his jaw tenses and then he nods, curtly. She steps past him, wearing just yesterday's gown. She feels it, the quiet cool air in the hall and takes a deep breath in, letting it settle deep in her throat, quieten every quip she has at the ready. 

He huffs at the door and she feels some deep sort of self-satisfaction that she can still elicit some sort of response from him. 

It's only burning rage that sees him snatching her coat from her door and slamming it shut behind them but she'll take it. 

 

 

 

She barely remembers the flight there, extricates herself from his clutches before he's even hit the ground. Her waist still feels warm where his hands were but by the time she's taken a few steps away from him and that deep earthy scent of his, her whole body is cold again. They are high, higher than the clouds, which move past them like snowy barges, curling around the treeline as they pass. They've landed on an outcrop, clearly used in the past as some sort of meeting spot given the campfire in the centre, the trees cleared around them in a neat ring. 

'You're welcome  _Nesta,'_ he chirps. 

'Are we thanking our captors these days?'

He glares at her, 'you're not a prisoner.'

She tilts her head and grimaces, all teeth, 'aren't I?'

She surveys it then, because she knows he's watching her, waiting for some sort of reaction, lucidity or otherwise. Doubtless relaying every movement to Rhys and her sister. 

It's high above the valley and she can vaguely make out the bay where Velaris begins, visible in between the moving clouds. The air tastes different here, she can smell the rain forming, likely a few hours away. Again, that warm, earthy, entirely  _male_ scent of his crawls in and assaults her senses. She barely restrains herself from recoiling in full. 

' _This place,'_ he says and she can hear the effort to keep his voice level, 'could be helpful.'

'You mean it would be helpful for me to be here for  _them,'_ she says. 

She watches him wince, his face such an open book for her to read. He is so _easy_ to manipulate in this way. 

'That is not why Feyre sent you here.'

'No, she sent me here because she could not look at me. Pity is truly the most revolting form of sympathy.'

The wind hisses through the trees, whipping the clouds away. She curls her arms around herself, brings her coat closer. It does little to stave off the bite of cold that gathers at the exposed skin at her throat. 

'Do you deserve sympathy?' he says, quietly. 

Her entire body stills at that and she realises how much  _better_ her Fae body is. How it can document every microscopic movement in the air, can slow time so she can see the particles of moisture gathering in the air, rain or snow, swirling in the air. She hates every thing about it. 

She shrugs off the icicles settling in the deep dips of her collarbones, too many long nights and too little food have left her hollowed out, full of nothing but emptiness. 

'Do you?' she asks.

He ignores her and points in between them at the ring of stones, 'aren't you going to ask where we are?'

Nesta just stares back, bored and  _cold._

'This is  _Kolos.'_

 _'_ Am I supposed to know what that is?'

'No,' he huffs, 'I was about to tell you.' 

He rolls his shoulders back and she watches the braided leather along his arms strain against the muscles in his arm. That oaky, earthy smell curls up her nose and her eyes close, for just a moment she can feel him behind her, hard against her back, breathing down her neck, Hybern standing in front of her, death and destruction oozing from his very  _being ,_ feeling like she had just found her beginning at her end, sweat biting at the bloody gashes on her skin, and then - 

'Kolos is a meeting place. An offering place. You cannot go into the village without giving something,' he says to her and unsheaths one of his daggers. 

Her hands find themselves pressed against her dress as she wipes the clammy death from her palms. Swallows the bile down her throat. 

'I don't have anything,' she murmurs, her fingers finding her thighs as she digs her nails in, tries to keep the woozy nausea from returning, tries to block out the metallic smell of his dagger from her mind, from her hands. From those hands, those hands that plunged the sword into Hybern and his head, rolling - 

He places the dagger, she doesn't recognise it, avoids looking at it and yet can't keep her eyes off it, in the centre of the ring. 

'This is enough, this time. Next time, come prepared.'

His eyes flash up to her and she regrets making eye contact the moment it happens. She  _hates_ the look in his eyes, it is so cloying and pitying. 

'Now what?' she says, half-expecting fanfare in this stupid magic world. 

He laughs, a bit bemused. 'It's an offering, to their gods.'

'Who is 'they'? she asks, arms crossed over her chest. 

He doesn't offer any answer, just points behind her, vaguely into the distance of some trees and says, 'walk. You'll find out soon.'

She doesn't tell him that her legs are aching from standing this long or that it is by sheer force of will that she has not curled in on herself from the cold. She takes a step forward, feels every bone in her feet creak against the biting cold and stalks past him.

 

 


End file.
